The most normal I felt in a while

First, I've gotten a lot of response from friends and family basically on how my blog has been moping. And it's true. To quote a friend:

You're right, you're not the same person you were and memory hurts. But we'll make new memories together.

Thank you. And I know that life goes on. I miss him though, the old me. He was a bit of an idiot, lazy as sin, and just plain weird some times though. But we had good times together. It's like breaking up with someone you really cared about: you know that life can't return to the way things were but you miss them so much it hurts. So if I mope, I'm sorry. This too will pass away.

Second, I had a really normal morning, though this is not a good thing in this case. Last night I cracked the window but closed the curtain, making it dark but chilly. I snuggled under 3 layers of covers, making myself a small cocoon of warmth. I woke up feeling good, my back a little achy but not actively painful. And I didn't want to move.
I pushed my snooze button 4 or 5 times, only finally pulling myself out of bed to make it to my Physics class (to which I was 5 min late too anyway). I quickly copied down the work on the board, catching up with what little time I had, thinking back to my nice warm bed.
If this isn't a normal moment, I don't know what is: sleeping in until the last possible moment because of my nice and toasty bed, making it to class just in time to get the material, and spending my remaining free time thinking about how I really just want to go back to bed. Yep, normal morning.

Wheelchair Hands

It's official, I'm a wheelchair user.
My hands bear the marks of traveling far distances. Even though I wear gloves whenever I wheel around I still have distinctive marks:
I have callous built up from between my thumbs and forefingers, extending all the way to the heel of my hand.
I have blisters from where the tires run across my palm.
My thumbs look worn down, as if chiseled away by sandpaper (in reality this is where my thumb rubs across my tires when I'm not paying attention.

It is said you can tell a lot about a person's life from their hands. My story is just a little more obvious than others.

Dealing with my greatest and weakest moments

There is probably no more terrible instance of enlightenment than the one in which you discover your father is a man — with human flesh.
Dune Frank Herbert

For the last few weeks I haven't posted anything. My life has been too complicated, too involved. I didn't know how to put these adventures into words. But in these past few weeks I have felt the magnitude of my strength and the depth of my weakness.

So for all of you who follow this blog know that I finally left Maryland. I traveled down with my mother to North Carolina, where my parents house is. Right on the water of an inland sound, the view is breathtaking. A neighbor of my parents built a gigantic ramp by the back of the house so that I could go in and out. It is the Michaelangelo of ramps, blending in seamlessly with the back porch that runs the length of the house. I knew that one reason that we went to North Carolina was for me to see and use that ramp, which I did.

Now going down to North Carolina was a break from the real world. I had no responsibilities except to exercise and stay fit. And that I did. I felt the stronger there than I have since my second back surgery. I walked back and forth across my parents lawn, circling the house. I walked the path down to the water and back. I scoffed at the neighbors boat launch, which was suggested to me for getting into the water. Instead I decided to jump down the step ladder on my parents dock. Hard to keep a turtle out of the water. I felt good, I felt strong. It was like the adrenaline rush I got once after a wrestling match. I had beaten a guy 15 lbs over my weight on home turf, with everyone from my school watching. Afterwards I sprinted the halls, enjoying the feeling that I could do anything.







I felt strong, but the trip cross country knocked the strength out of me. We traveled almost 1200 miles, stopping every 3 hours or so to rest and stretch. My body felt as if I had been beaten, kicked around, then beaten some more. At the end of every day I collapsed into my motel bed, drained of all energy. I didn't travel all that well before; now I don't travel well at all.

But I made it here. I'm set up in my apartment with a ramp-van to get me around to classes and physical therapy. But there is something different about Fort Collins now. The romantic vision I had of this place is gone. People's lives have moved on: some lives have disintegrated, others have gotten married, and still others may be dying soon. This is not the place I left and I am not the person who left it. And though they try to act as though nothing has happened, my friends are still getting to know this new wheelchair person that's entered into their lives.

I've seen the weakest I can get as well. After a long day, exhausted, my body aches. All I want to do is lay down and never get up I know I can't. I get so week to the point I can pass out, my body finally saying "Fuck this, I've had enough. You are resting NOW." Always a control freak, it's frightening to have so much of my own body out of my control. It takes constant vigilance, a drive to always work on keeping my body fit. I admit I don't always keep up with this; my mind is tired as well. Having long ago come to the realization that if I don't keep up with my exercises and stretches my body only goes down hill. But having the knowledge and putting into practice are two different things.

So here I am, a new person in a new place with new goals. I've seen my greatest and my weakest moments; it's tantalizing that I know just how far I can go but frightening just how far I can fall. I have a feeling I'll get through but it would be nice if life didn't insist on showing my limits, reminding me just how human I am.

Memory

My life recently has been a small multitude of lifetimes. How long ago it seems, when I proudly strolled across campus, or more likely biking illegally through the bike dismount zone (they ticket you if you're caught). Fortunately, I found that while they had cops on either end of campus they never posted one through the section of campus between Eddie and the library. This allowed me to zoom across both sides of campus easily. Now I wheel myself around now, knowing it will be along time before I can stroll in any way through those grounds. It's not that these things aren't attainable, but the memory of my life from before flood back.

So I survived a week in NC with the folks. Tenuous at times, but what 21 year old doesn't have with his folks. More interesting was our trip cross country, 1800 miles. I'll post more on these two things later, but for right now be satisfied that the whole trip was tiring as hell. But I survived.

And now I'm back, set up in an apartment not far from my local haunts. I remember walking, biking, driving these roads. While I know I'll get into routines, patterns, and develop new haunts; but it is strange to have dreamed about a place for so long to find it again, especially when it doesn't fit neatly into memory. Lives have moved, new bonds were broken and others forged, the city refuses to stop for a returned son. It would have been far stranger if things had stopped, but I can't say that some part of me secreted away for so long half wished it had.

I've come to terms with life, God, and the nature of fate. I accepted the person I had become. I can't honestly that there aren't certain parts of me I had to let die, and I've mourned the old me. It's hard to avoid. But like any death, time eventually and you notice that you subconsciously have switched to talking about the loss as something from the past rather than the present. You've blinked and months have passed. It's like any death, the deep longing within your self lessens, though when you think you still think with intensity.

It's like walking down a path, only to realize that you and your late best friend or lover used to walk there lifetimes ago. You feel a longing for that place and time, when things were simple. 'This too will pass and change,' you tell your conscious self, knowing that it still doesn't quite believe you.

A Fond Memory

When at Kennedy Krieger, we were lucky enough to have Wii in a mobile unit, meaning that you could take it to any of the rooms. This was amazing, since it gave a little life to the otherwise boring evenings.

My room was one of the biggest, fitting three different full sized beds. Our room had a great atmosphere because for a while, the three beds were all filled with people over 15; this allowed the nurses and aids to give us a little more slack than we otherwise would have gotten, since we some of the oldest patients. We were allowed to stay awake until midnight, blatantly flouting the 10 o'clock lights-out.

It was possible to check out the mobile Wii for the evening, having to return it at the end of the night. One of my roommates somehow managed to check out the unit and not return it. No one came looking for it, so we kept the wii for weeks.

The favorite game of choice was Mario Kart. Having not played Mario Kart during my childhood, I was at an extreme disadvantage. I got the hang of it pretty quickly, mostly due to the fact that I had fewer hours of things to do during the day than the those who still had to attend classes. Eventually the roommate who had checked out the Wii left inpatient and we were left with machine. Because he had left they failed to track down the wii for quite some time.

Leaving Soon

I have put off writing this post for a long time. I have known that I'd be leaving at the end of July but it doesn't seem quite real, even now. But I guess since everyone is asking I should be more specific.

My therapy at Kennedy Krieger outpatient is dwindling down. They've done all they could in the restraints that they had(i.e. back/arm surgeries); the restrictions on my arm are finally been lifted on Thursday, which will allow me to use a walker and the loftstrands(hand-crutches). Thursday also marks the day that I get the PIC-line IV out of my arm, which will finally leg me take a shower without wrapping up my arm, and most importantly, will allow this turtle to swim in a pool. We leave this Friday. Talk about a day late and a dollar short.

These past 7 months have been a never-ending stream of surgeries and after-surgery restrictions. Always fighting to claw my way up to where I was; but to tell you the truth I don't fully remember what it was to just get out of bed every morning and live my life without thought. I don't remember how to do a lot of things. The person that I was is gone, at least in part, changed after so many lifetimes of hard work, pain, blood, sweat, and tears. So much I care for is still in Colorado but it makes me nervous to return. It's like returning to a place you loved as a child; you want desperately to see it again but consciously know you'll be looking at things with different eyes.

This friday we'll pack up the last of our stuff and drive to North Carolina. I haven't been to my parents house in over a year at this point so it'll be interesting to see. Especially now that I'm stuck on the first floor. They did build a giant ramp so at least I'll be able to get in and out. Of course we'll be there during a giant heat wave, so I may be hiding inside more often than not.


After that we take a week-long road trip out to Colorado. I'm dreading that with more fervor since I don't do well in long car rides as is. Pains in my right leg, combine with back pain and the general stiffness that comes from not moving make it a hassle. I have a couple of tricks to combat this: stretching, icyhot, electrical stimulation, medication. Nothing ever works completely so I'm constantly switching between these. We'll see how it goes I guess.

Then I'll be in Fort Collins again. Only a semester late, I guess that's better than could be expected. I'll take it.

Nutrition

Even though my stats have all been going up, my parents are still worried that I am not getting enough nutrients. I have been drink a drink called "Boost" which is a dietary supplement drink. Tastes metallic but is otherwise alright. I guess in the long run it's a good thing, though I've had to force myself to drink them all before we leave (everything that is not either mailed/stored/eaten we will have to carry with us.

It reminds me of this: